Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a wet powder manufacturing apparatus and a wet powder manufacturing method for manufacturing wet powder.
Description of the Background Art
A coating step is used when forming a thin layer on a solid, such as a thin plate. In the coating step, the solid is coated with fluid (paste or slurry) obtained by kneading powder which is a raw material of the thin layer with liquid. Then, a drying step is carried out to remove the liquid to form a layer of aggregation of powder on the solid. The above-described steps are used for manufacturing an electrode plate of a secondary battery, for example.
Since the drying step is very burdensome, it has been tried recently to use wet powder with a smaller mixing ratio of liquid than in the above-described fluid. Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 10-216575 discloses a method for manufacturing such wet powder with a smaller mixing ratio of liquid.
Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 10-216575 discloses a technique for spraying slurry having a solid content and a solvent in a chamber to obtain granulated powder with the solvent removed therefrom. The granulated powder thus obtained is considered to correspond to the above-described wet powder because of its low content of a liquid component.